Screenwriter/Director/Author Rocco Simonelli's home on the web.

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Read and/or download selected posts of Rocco's written work.

Feature Length Screenplays

SWIRLEE: the feature length original screenplay

Over the years, many people have seen the 15 minute rough cut short version of SWIRLEE, as well as the 2 minute trailer which was culled from it. But few have read the feature length screenplay. Read it now and see why it's been called "one of the greatest movies never made."

An independent filmmaker is so desperate to secure the money to finish his debut film, he agrees to perform a mob hit - thus the title. Struggling at the moment of truth with actually committing the act, he takes his would-be victim hostage, leading to a battle of wits and will that culminates explosively in a way neither could have imagined. SWIMMING WITH SHARKS meets THE SOPRANOS.

The story of a recluse whose life becomes dangerously entwined with the prostitute who lives in the apartment across the hall from his own. Both characters harbor guilty secrets that have left them emotionally - as well as physically - imprisoned, and it is only through their brief but intense relationship that each is able to win freedom from the past.

This is my version of Frank Capra's It's a Wonderful Life. Or, more accurately, my indictment of its premise - that the character of George Bailey as depicted in the film has actually had a wonderful life. After watching the movie countless times, I finally came to the conclusion that EVERYBODY ELSE in Bedford Falls has had a wonderful life -- at George's expense! Some who have read this think it's funny and right on the mark, while there are others who have never forgiven me for writing it. I'm okay with either reaction.

THE NAME AND MR. NO-NAME, Chapter 6 of SHOOT ME: INDEPENDENT FILMMAKING FROM CREATIVE CONCEPT TO ROUSING RELEASE, published by Allworth Press. This chapter recounts one of the more harrowing crises Roy and I faced in making our independent romantic comedy THE SWEET LIFE.

The first of a quartet of short scripts depicting New Yorkers grappling with the difficulties of living in a city forever altered by Guiliani, the Disneyfication of Times Square, and 9/11. In OUT OF THE GOODNESS, a self-serving would-be do-gooder's inauthentic attempt to assist a homeless man backfires on her in terrible and unforeseen ways.

The second of a quartet of short scripts depicting New Yorkers grappling with the difficulties of living in a city forever altered by Guiliani, the Disneyfication of Times Square, and 9/11. In MY KINGDOM FOR A HORSE, an African-American actor portraying Richard the Third on stage in Central Park learns his mother is dying uptown and races to reach her at Harlem Hospital before it's too late. His increasingly desperate and futile attempts to secure a taxi trigger chaos and violence.

The third of a quartet of short scripts depicting New Yorkers grappling with the difficulties of living in a city forever altered by Guiliani, the Disneyfication of Times Square, and 9/11. BLACK GIRLS ARE DIFFERENT is a darkly comic take on interracial relationships in Manhattan as a white Jewish male upper-eastsider falls in love with a black "princess."

The fourth of a quartet of short scripts depicting New Yorkers grappling with the difficulties of living in a city forever altered by Guiliani, the Disneyfication of Times Square, and 9/11. In HEAVY WALKER, a sleep deprived woman is plagued by the nightly pacing of an upstairs neighbor, causing her to brood on increasingly violent fantasies. Turned away by her therapist, dumped by her boyfriend and brushed off by her landlord, she charges upstairs to finish things once and for all. But what she finds in that upstairs apartment is as unexpected as her final response, which makes it clear that, in New York, one must adapt to survive.